Afloia 2 Qt Electric Ice Cream Maker Review

Afloia 2 Qt Electric Ice Cream Maker Review

Buy it at Amazon: Afloia 2 Qt Electric Ice Cream Maker [Affiliate Link]

Takeaway: High capacity, easy to use, tasty results.

You’ll receive the ice cream maker and an instruction manual. The unit measures 11 inches tall, 8.5 inches deep and 8.5inches wide. The unit is made of a lightweight plastic and the translucent black cover at the top is removable with a simple counter-clockwise twist. The rounded-corner opening in the middle allows you to monitor your ice cream’s progress and make additions during churning. In the machine you’ll find a plastic churning paddle. There are two outer wall-scraping blades, and a center stirring blade that will churn and distribute the ice cream in the machine. It uses a 2 quart freezer bowl that has a smooth, white plastic exterior and aluminum interior. the bowl has a 5.25 inch diameter opening and is 4.75 inches deep. The bowl is quite lightweight and weighs only 4 lbs, despite being filled with a gel liquid freezing agent. If you shake the bowl when it’s defrosted, you’ll hear the liquid sloshing around.

The main body of the ice cream maker houses the motor. It has a thick, heavy-duty two-prong attached power cable that measures 6 ft long. The ice cream maker has a lifetime warranty, and there’s some information on the back for registration and support, though that sticker is removable. At the front is a simple toggle dial for off and on. On the bottom of the freezer bowl is a gear-shaped cutout, which matches perfectly with the gear inside the main body. There’s even a drainage hole in the back corner in case any liquid spills between the bowl and the housing by accident. The hole drains straight to the bottom of the machine so that it won’t damage any of the internal components. There are rubber feet on the bottom for stability and a fan exhaust to keep the motor cool.

Assembling the machine is simple. Just place the freezer bowl in the main housing and rotate until it drops over the gear, place the stirring paddle in the bowl, then drop the cover on top and turn clockwise to lock in place. The instruction manual provides a few tips and tricks for using the machine and several recipes. I've made ice cream a couple times since getting this machine and was happy with the results, however, do think there are a couple tricks you can use to ensure your ice cream comes out smooth and delicious. The first is to be sure to set your freezer at the lowest temperature possible before setting the bowl inside to freeze. While mine’s usually set to 4 degrees F, I lower it to -6 degrees to ensure the bowl is as cold as possible when I start churning.

The second tip is to mix your ingredients the day before and set in the refrigerator overnight so that all the ingredients will be cold before you pour it into the machine. This helps you get the most churning/freezing time out of the bowl since the cold ingredients need to lose less energy to freeze and will not defrost the bowl as fast as warm ingredients would. While you can use smaller batch recipes for 1.5 quarts, I recommend churning full 2 Qt recipes to maximize the amount of ingredients touching the frozen walls of the bowl. When assembling the frozen bowl and adding the ingredients, make sure to turn the machine on before adding your ice cream liquid; speed is key since you don’t want the freezer bowl to defrost too much after it comes out of the freezer. What I noticed about this ice cream maker is that it rotates fairly slowly compared to other ice cream makers that I've used, like the Cuisinart ICE-21. I also noticed that there’s a pretty wide gap between the paddle and the freezer bowl. What that means is that it will take more time to build up enough frozen ice cream on the sides of the bowl before it gets scraped into the middle. Initially my main concern was that the ice cream would end up a bit icy and not as smooth and creamy as I wanted if the churn speed was too slow, as that allows larger ice crystals to form.

One thing that I think might help on hot days is to place a cover over the top, like a silicone lid, to prevent ambient heat from entering the bowl and melting your ice cream while it’s churning. Another trick I use to avoid overly icy churns is to add a shot of spirits or liqueur at the end of the churn. This lowers the freezing point of the batch making it set up softer for easier scooping. Of course, then the ice cream would be for adults 21 years and older only. If you do add alcohol, be sure to keep it in the freezer until the last minute or two of churning so that it’s as cold as possible. Then let the machine mix it in for a couple minutes. You don’t want to add a lot of additional time since the alcohol will cause the ice cream to melt a bit. Average total churn time is about 35-40 minutes depending on your starting temperatures and ingredients used.

When emptying out the freezer bowl, the ice cream may be a bit soupy but should have frozen bits throughout like a milkshake or slushie. Ideally it would be a little bit thicker like the texture of soft serve ice cream. When you scrape out the freezer bowl, make sure to use a rubber or silicone spatula and nothing hard like metal, plastic, or wood as any of these materials could scratch or damage the interior of the bowl and affect its performance. Then freeze the churned ice cream overnight so that it can fully set.

My ice cream recipes made ice cream in this machine with a dense, smooth buttery texture. It’s not as airy and light as store bought ice cream, but I don't use any additives (except liquers) or texture conditioners so for a basic recipe, it’s pretty good. I’m actually quite pleased with how it turned out. Honestly the hardest part of this process is waiting for the ice cream to set! recipes with fruit tend to be icier due to the water content of the fruit, so if you want a smoother texture, you’d have to add more solids to break that up. You could do that by making a custard base, with egg yolks, added dry milk powder, or adding additional sugar, but obviously that would have an impact on the final taste of the ice cream. You could even add in another shot of alcohol during churning to soften it up even more. The plain recipes are still really good, and I love how the ice cream batches turned out.

Buy it at Amazon: Afloia 2 Qt Electric Ice Cream Maker [Affiliate Link]